To My Family: Yes, I'm Donating My Body to the College of Liberal Arts

Making gross anatomy shine at the College of Liberal Arts.

Good afternoon. I’ve gathered you here today because you’re the best of the best. And because you’re my family.

I’m happy to announce that I am donating my body to the College of Liberal Arts. I will be escaping the slow march of death by running straight to those funny English majors sleeping near the coffee machine.

See, the thing with donating my biowaste is I don’t need my dead body being jabbed into on a cutting board surrounded by a bunch of highly intelligent and curious doctors. I detest the very sight of tabletop medical equipment. Reflex hammers: that’s what I’m talking about. My celestial spirit shouldn’t have to overhear intense academics communicate important medical information. It may be their chosen field, but my body isn’t a laboratory, okay?

C’mon! I’d like to do anatomical explorations while I’m still alive, am I right guys?! I’m supposed to put my dead body on the line as an example of what happens to you when you don’t drink enough cold bean water? Really? I’m insulted by the accusation. These future taxidermists would giggle the ever-loving shit out of every tattoo placement and my inflamed eczema would be live-tweeted. It’s a non-contagious skin rash. It isn’t a huge part of my life, NERDS!

I feel compelled to help the humanities program with their flow of corpses. This is going to take some serious planning and managing, not to mention the switching of rubber or plastic cadavers in lieu of my real dead body. Some of the brightest humans study philosophy. History. Fine arts. My dead body deserves nimble artists unbothered by future joblessness.

By now I’m sure all of you have some religious concerns as to my arrangements since I won’t be laid to rest in a nicely built tomb. Don’t get me wrong, a grave to visit is obviously VERY important, but I am absolutely committed to this endeavor. I am willing to be cut up into beef stew-size pieces with an electric chainsaw just as long as the folks carving me up are sports writers from the campus radio station.

Gifting my carcass to the Social Sciences Department is groundbreaking stuff. The fact that you guys are reaching for tortilla chips and salsa indicates that you’re heartbroken. I hear yawns in the room, so it’s pretty clear everyone’s wracked by grief at my newfangled plan.

Please try to remain optimistic.

My special donation is a painless one—believe me. Take comfort in knowing that I’ll be “the full package” that students are required to get when they sign up.

Yeah, take general studies majors. THEY will leave me untouched. There’s no way they get one good look at my veins and think, “Yeah, I could stick an IV in that.” Pull out my tongue with a pair of pliers? Spackle my belly button? Sharpie the especially funny bits? These students are far too busy glue sniffing to notice my inexorable stench. They’ll weigh their options of either driving me in the carpool lane or locking me inside the soda vending machine as a temporary mausoleum. Just place me next to the Twix candy!

That reminds me, I need to eat something. I therefore bequeath my bod to the nontraditional general studies students because they know how to tailgate and score free food.

Now, poets. A soft-hearted, romantic poet will probably try to have sex with me. Completely permissible. It’s kind of an elaborate fantasy of mine.

Huh?

Sorry. I was lost in thought.

Look, we can sit here all day examining the metaphysical meaning of my death, but I know what’s best for my body, OK? And that’s to unlawfully grant access to sustainable beekeeping professors whom have never seen a dead body before, let alone touched one.

Also, I don’t wish to be one of those anonymous donors. For God’s sake, make sure you spell and pronounce my name clearly when the time comes. Thank you.

Where’s Mom going? Hey, why is Mom walking out of the room, mumbling something about my web series being her only grandchild? Too choked up, huh? Yeah, this may seem like a lot to deal with, but this here is an untapped market: snubbing the fancy white coats and rewarding the dreamers.

I stand by my decision. I don’t want to be cremated; I want to be curated.

Yeah, if you don’t mind, I need you, my dear family—well, just you, Pops—to sign off on my terminus by the end of the day. Death could be hurtling AT ME. With your blessing, my dead body can be the essential learning tool for that vocal performance major.

Hi! I’m a fiction writer and screenwriter. Films have screened at the American Film Institute in Los Angeles, Carolines On Broadway in NYC and The Harvard Film Archive in Massachusetts.... See full profile »